


My Chains Are Gone

by thimble



Category: Devilman (Anime & Manga)
Genre: M/M, Time Loop, based on the events of crybaby, but incorporates themes from the og manga and lady
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-21
Updated: 2019-06-21
Packaged: 2020-05-15 22:58:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,011
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19305556
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thimble/pseuds/thimble
Summary: Ryo is always the one to walk away first, and Akira never has to be prompted to follow. Today shouldn't be any different. Ryo extends his hand and waits for Akira to take it.Akira's answering contempt stings like a wound unstitched. Ryo's arm falls to his side as Akira turns around and retraces his steps down that familiar hill, the shape of his back imprinted behind Ryo's lids when he blinks.It's an impossible certainty: Akira already walked away from him once. But why? Where?When?In accordance with His divine plan, God torments Ryo again—and again—and again.But Ryo was never meant to realize.





	My Chains Are Gone

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the [From Here To Eternity](https://twitter.com/ryokirazine) zine.

I.

Akira is warm. Akira _was_ warm. That was before.

Ryo learned this through observation and application, like most other things he knows. Spread his arms wide enough and reliably, inevitably, Akira will sink into them, a ship anchored at the harbor. Akira's body heat would saturate his clothes; Akira's smile would tickle his skin, feather-soft. After Akira's transformation into Devilman there was more of him to wrap around, but the principle was the same.

And here, now, as Ryo holds what's left of him, he realizes that while the shape of Akira is familiar in a way he remembers, Akira is cold in a way he shouldn't. The cold seeps through divine flesh, divine bone, divine light, until the only warmth left in Ryo are the tears still falling from his cheeks.

In the distance, the chiming of bells. In his arms, a boy sculpted in ice. A new one for the history books, but somehow a memory, fresh as a wound.

Ryo, bestowed with all knowledge of creation, doesn't understand.

 

* * *

 

He moves, and it feels preordained. This is not the first battle he and his demons have fought; this is the first time it's Akira on the other side. But when he draws his arm back to deliver a blow, it's an echo of one that came before it. How can that be, if this is the first time? Akira has never looked at him with hatred so tangible his head is knocked back from the whiplash, and yet, and yet—

In the distance, Akira is charging forward, fangs bared and arms wide open. In his hands, Ryo gathers divine light to welcome him with. Ryo lets the light loose, and in that instant, insignificant in the fabric of eternity, sees Akira halved on the cliffside they call their own, all before the light ever reaches him.

But white fills Ryo's vision before he could take it back. His smile, mirroring Akira's gritted teeth, falls away.

 

* * *

 

Ryo is always the one to walk away first, and Akira never has to be prompted to follow. Today shouldn't be any different. Ryo extends his hand and waits for Akira to take it.

Akira's answering contempt stings like a wound unstitched. Ryo's arm falls to his side as Akira turns around and retraces his steps down that familiar hill, the shape of his back imprinted behind Ryo's lids when he blinks.

It's an impossible certainty: Akira already walked away from him once. But why? Where? _When ?_

 

 

 

 

 

II.

There used to be no name for the feeling in his chest as Akira is swallowed by the horizon. It's a feeling that shouldn't exist, unheard of where he came from; it's a feeling that was born only when he was cast out of His kingdom.

The humans were the ones to give it a voice. Sorrow, they called it, paltry and inadequate to describe being apart from His presence, but creatures as small as they are could not have conceived of a loss so vast and encompassing. Ryo makes do.

Sorrow is what takes Akira's place at his side. The feeling is akin to his fall, to the pain of no longer having His love. The conclusion is laughably easy to arrive at, once he has the right words.

 _This_ , says the part of him still human, _this, too, is love._

 

* * *

 

The feeling explains his unease as Moyuru Koda rampages the stadium—not for the athletes trapped inside, but for Akira. Preposterous, really. Akira is a Devilman, and is perfectly capable of defending himself. None of his blood will stain the ground, because it isn't in Ryo's plan.

Yet the unease remains. It asks, what if the plan goes wrong? What if Akira gets hurt? What if your love is not enough to protect him?

The question doesn't give him pause like he thought it would. Simply, he answers, _it is. It will be._

 

* * *

 

Carefully, he lifts the water bottle to Akira's lips, and wills his fingers to stop trembling. There's no point to it, not when he knows that Akira is alive. But love had seen Akira unconscious and thought the worst; love had rushed to Akira's side, at the expense of his pristine white coat.

Love, Ryo finds, is not a logical thing at all.

 

* * *

 

"I love you, Akira." To his ears, it makes sense. To love Akira is to be with him forever, without company or distraction.

Akira's face contorts, but he doesn't cry. "You don't know what love is, Ryo."

Again, he walks away. Again, Ryo's heart reminds him it's there by breaking.

 

* * *

 

Eventually, the rush of fighting Akira fades, but Akira's hatred doesn't. Again and again, the cliffside, the coldness in his arms, the warmth on his cheeks.

 

 

 

 

 

III.

When he speaks, the moon is his only audience. The distance between him and the stars is too great, just as it had been between his and Akira's ideals. Tyranny is what had inspired his rebellion, but a tyrant is what he had become.

He's no better than God—he knows that now.

"I was wrong, Akira." He veers away from the script, even if it's too late for them, this time, because there's been countless thems before this moment, and there will be more after it if he doesn't change. "I'll be better than Him, I promise."

Beside him, Akira is silent, eternally still, but above him the moon seems to be smiling.

 

* * *

 

It's difficult not to think it's all futile, when the realization comes only after they've passed the point of no return. With the earth burning beneath them, he implores Akira to listen. With the Makimura girl's head cradled gently in Akira's arms, Ryo asks for forgiveness.

Sometimes it comes—once the fighting is over, in the way Akira's eyes soften before they close—but he never expects it.

 

* * *

 

Back then, Psycho Jenny would tell him who he is, but not what he's supposed to do. Maybe she trusted her Lord Satan to decide for himself; maybe she'd been waiting for him to change as well. It would be simpler, to turn the humans against each other and against Akira like he'd done before, though he knows, now, that it will backfire, and turn Akira against him too.

But they were never meant to be enemies. Maybe he saved Akira so they could fight together, and if saving Akira means saving humanity, then so be it.

Outside the Makimura house, Ryo knocks on the door. There are a number of people inside, and any of them could've opened it, but of course the face that greets him is Akira's.

"It's late, Ryo," he says, curious but attentive. "What are you doing here?"

A question without an easy answer. Quietly, Ryo tugs on Akira so they could both sit at the doorstep, alone if not for the distant sounds of the city and the stars. He says, "strange as it may seem, I want you to think of the day you found me."

Because where is he supposed to start, if not from the beginning?

 

 

 

 

 

IV.

In the universe He created, there are no happy endings. There are stories that stop in the middle, after great evils have been defeated and great loves have conquered all; there are white lies told to children and escapism sold to adults to make life a little more bearable. But heartache awaits at every finish line, and parting is inevitable because death is inevitable.

(Perhaps this is in His grand design—the purposeful existence of emptiness, so that His children may seek Him to feel full.)

There are no happy endings, but knowing a truth is different to seeing it unfold.

It's different, for Akira to take his place by Ryo's side, only to have him be ripped away by forces greater than either of them. It's different, to have felt God's wrath himself, and to see Akira burn in its wake because of him. It's different, to have rebelled against heaven, and different to bear witness to its infinite rejections.

Because Akira no longer dies by Ryo’s hand, but death claims him nonetheless.

 

 

 

 

 

V.

Divine punishment isn't without its small miracles. God sees all, so there's no real hiding under His gaze, but on a certain cliffside by the ocean, Ryo steals a moment with Akira before another final battle.

They've never had this much time alone, away from demons and devilmen alike; Ryo's never found the right opportunity to tell Akira everything he ought to know, so this is what he does now.

"We've been here before," he says, staring at the moon in lieu of staring at Akira. "Countless other befores..."

He tells Akira about the first time, the last time, and all the other times in between. Everything, but the reason he did it all in the first place. And when the silence becomes unbearable, reminiscent of all the other silent Akiras of the past, his brows knot and his voice begs, "Akira, say something."

"I remember."

Ryo turns his head to look at Akira, only to find Akira already looking at him. There's an expression on Akira's face that's softer than forgiveness, gentler than even understanding; it dampens Ryo's eyes, loosens his tongue.

"Akira, I..."

"I remember that, too."

Akira says nothing else, and he doesn't need to. His smile is gospel, a revelation in itself—it may be Ryo's punishment to watch him die over and over, but God isn't without His mistakes, if He allowed Ryo to meet Akira at all.

Because love does not die when you tell it to; love only grows stronger through trial and tribulation. Didn't God write it in His holy book Himself?

Love _never_ fails.

 

 

 

 

 

VI.

For the longest while, he could only ever remember fighting—forever and without end. Losing to God seemed not just a punishment but a destiny, like he was created to be an example among the angels, defiance written into his core and not evidence of free will.

They say sever the head of the beast and the rest will follow. Together, he and Akira deliver the final blow. Together, like they were always meant to, they win, and it occurs to Ryo that it was Akira who was meant to save him all along.

Piece by piece, reality falls to ruin around them.

"What now, Ryo?" asks Akira, still whole, this time. "Will you take His place?"

It's tempting to answer yes. After all this, he deserves to be happy, doesn't he? To have everything go his way?

Instead, he says, "there are no gods in the world I want. No being higher than another." _A world_ , he doesn't say, _where you can be happy_. With his palm he cups Akira's cheek, and Akira leans into the touch like a kitten rescued from the rain.

"Is this your last act as Satan?"

"No," says Ryo, leaning forward. "It's this."

And there goes Akira's smile again, sweet as a victory upon Ryo's lips.

(Happy endings, as it turns out, are actually beginnings.)

 

 

 

 

 

VII.

It's not his knees, scratched up after he was shoved to the ground, that hurt most. It's not the names either—he's heard them all before, and worse, at previous schools. Wounds heal, and words lose their meaning, but it's the laughter that gets to him, a reminder that he'll be alone wherever he goes. Friends, it seems, are for everyone else.

"Are you okay?"

Startled, though he tries not to let it show, Ryo looks up. There's a small hand being offered to him, one that belongs to a dark-haired boy that never joined in the laughter. Akira is his name, if Ryo remembers correctly. Though he hates the way it trembles, his hand finds its way into Akira's palm, and he's pulled into an embrace before he can protest or react.

"Don't be afraid," sniffles Akira, tears soaking Ryo's shirt. That's right; they call him Akira the crybaby. Reflexively, Ryo considers pushing him away, but everyone else has been so, so cold to him, while Akira—

Akira is _warm_.

 


End file.
